It’s still not easy for me to say, “I’m bipolar.” I have always felt torn between the reality of the pain I feel and the invisibility of the beauty I know. Despite hosting a podcast and writing a vulnerable book about my challenges with bipolar disorder, I still feel a tinge of terror when I tell people about this aspect of my identity. After wrestling with various terminology over many years, I have come to view the reappropriation of the label bipolar—separate from pathology—as a necessary activity. Here’s why:

I feel called to write about the intersection of whiteness and the recent reports of the Sakyong's sexual misconduct and abuse of power. I am heartbroken, since my affinity for Buddhadharma originates with Trungpa Rinpoche. Shambhala: Sacred Path of the Warrior saved my life, as it taught me to discover courage and possibility in every moment, just by staying with my raw, vulnerable heart. Ironically enough, these teachings taught me how to stay sober and how to find sanity in confusion. These insights of brokenhearted clarity are incomplete, yet they ring true to my heart, and so it is. I write this for the benefit of all beings. May we know our true nature.

We all come from a lot of places—families, communities, geographies. We have heroes and (s)heroes and (t)he(y)roes. We come from trainings and certifications and schools and institutions. I come from Naropa University.

I wrote the following essay for Emerging Proud, which supports folks with mental health challenges "coming out of the spiritual closet." Check out their work and continued offerings at emergingproud.com.

This is a great honor to be able to write something for Emerging Proud. When I think back on my story of awakening, I'm very careful to recognize that what I think of as “psychosis” and what I think of as “spiritual awakening” were never separate to begin with. The unity that I suddenly realized, the utter and complete wholeness of the universe and my place in it, was both excruciatingly painful and profoundly liberating.

As I consider the implications of Mental Health Awareness Month, I'm recalling the nature of sickness and illnesses and diseases of all kinds, and how open and courageous those folks with cancer are—how they are proud to endure, to have overcome, and even provide sage wisdom in times of great hardship, including death. But while cancer effects mental wellness in painful ways, the effect is somewhat predictable, and so it's not so hard to get on board with a cause we understand, to offer compassion, to see ourselves in each other's suffering.